Mariko is sitting on the apartment balcony with her notebook, diligently writing out her thoughts for the day. She doesn't really feel like it, she's got a bad cold and would sooner lie in bed being brought miso soup at regular intervals, but she knows she'll feel better if she sorts out her thoughts even if those thoughts are mostly that she hates being sick, and wishes she could assign the part of herself that wants to do things literally every day come what may to her immune system its own body to do this for her.

"A slightly more plausible explanation than you discovering magic on your own is someone becoming careless and displaying obvious magic in a place you could see. If that occurred, the responsibility would fall on them, not on you, and your own discovery of magic would be less alarming."

"If there's some reason that could plausibly fit within your personality for you to be looking at some population statistics or the raw data for some recent infectious diseases, we might be able to find a pattern you could have plausibly noticed."

"Because the truth is romantic. Your story is so unusual, no one has ever discovered magic their own before. You should go down in history. It's a tragedy for it to be brushed away as simply finding an unusual piece of math!"

"We don't know. The theory that seems most likely is that it was discovered by the church in a more raw form and then intentionally harnessed to the classic seven vices and virtues. But since then, it's true that there are no known instances of anyone discovering it independently."